FAQ

Traffic Tickets Solutions Law Firm FAQs

• Where is your office located?
• The ticket fine is minimal, why shouldn’t I just pay it?
• What happens if I ignore my ticket?
• Will a ticket in another province affect my license in Ontario?
• The officer didn’t show me his radar reading, will that get rid of my ticket?
• Does a mistake on my ticket make it invalid?
• The officer wrote down the wrong year of my car. Is this a fatal error?
• What are the chances that my ticket will be eliminated?
• Can you guarantee my results?
• What sort of factors can influence my case?
• I got a quote that was cheaper than yours. Why would I pay you more?
• If I file my court date and order disclosure, will your price go down?
• The officer told me to fight my ticket. Why would he do that? Will he reduce my ticket?
• How long does a ticket remain on my driving record?
• I heard that if I mail a cheque in for my fine with a few dollars extra, the ticket will not show on my record. Is this true?
• Will my insurance go up from one ticket on my record?
• Can an officer accurately clock my speed when he is in a moving vehicle also?
• Where can I keep updated on traffic ticket news and information?

Where is your office located?

Traffic Ticket Solutions is conveniently located near the 401 and 427 in Toronto, Ontario. For detailed information and map, please visit our Contact Us page.

The ticket fine is minimal, why shouldn’t I just pay it?

The fine amount on a traffic ticket is NOT the only penalty you could be facing. As soon as you pay the fine on a traffic ticket, you are pleading guilty to the offence along with all of the penalties associated with that ticket. These penalties could include demerit points, licence suspensions and even possible jail time! For detailed information on what you could be facing from paying a simple traffic ticket fine, please feel free to contact us to discuss the subject.

What happens if I ignore my ticket?

If you fail to respond to an Ontario traffic ticket, your licence could be suspended. On the back of every traffic ticket in Ontario, there is detailed information on the options you have to respond to the ticket and the amount of time that you have to do so. There is a 15 day time period to respond either guilty or not to a traffic ticket, but there is a grace period of about 30 days (depending on the court location) before the courts will convict you of the offence. A non-response to a ticket is equivalent of pleading guilty to the offence and all the penalties of a guilty plea will apply. After the 30 day grace period, the Ministry of Transportation (MTO) can suspend your licence and will send you a letter in the mail indicating that you are under suspension. If you are caught driving while under suspension and ticketed, you could be facing fines of $1000 – $5,000 with a possibility of an additional licence suspension for a minimum of 6 months.

Will a ticket in another province affect my licence in Ontario?

Any traffic ticket received in any other Province or Territory in Canada will result in a conviction and/or demerit points being recorded on your driving record in Ontario. There are even some states that have a reciprocal agreement with Ontario which could affect your driving record in Ontario. Ontario has a reciprocal agreement with the state of New York and Michigan at this time, but if you have any questions about a ticket you received out of Ontario and would like to see how it could affect you in Ontario, please contact the department of the MTO:

Licensing Administration Office
Ministry of Transportation
Main Floor, Building A
2680 Keele Street
Downsview, ON M3M 3E6

Tel: 416-235-2999 or 1-800-387-3445

For French enquiries, please call 1-800-387-3445.

The officer didn’t show me his radar reading, will that get rid of my ticket?

No. Officers are not required by law to show a radar reading and this will not stand up in court as a valid defence for a ticket. If you ask the office politely, they may be able to do so, but there are a few reasons that would not be able to comply with your request. Some of these reasons could be that it is unsafe for you to get out of the car to see the reading (if the radar is affixed inside the police car), or that the reading has been cleared for testing the gun or to clock other speeders.

Does a mistake on my ticket make it invalid?

This depends on the mistake as most simple errors, such as one or two letters incorrect in your name or a misspelled address written on the traffic ticket, will be amended in court. There are some fatal errors that can occur on the face of the ticket that could get a traffic ticket completely eliminated, but an expert would have to examine the ticket to know for sure. If there are problems with the Set Fine or driver’s licence number, there could be arguments that can hold up in court to have the ticket quashed, but the traffic ticket does not just disappear and the case still must be argued properly in front of the court.

The officer wrote down the wrong year of my car. Is this a fatal error?

No. Actually, nowhere on the traffic ticket does the officer record the year your vehicle was made as this information is not in any way important to the fact that you did or did not commit an offence. The section on the traffic ticket that indicates “Year” is actually referencing the year your sticker expires on your licence plate and not the year your vehicle was manufactured.

What are the chances that my ticket will be eliminated?

At this point, it is difficult for us to know what the exact outcome of your traffic ticket matter will be since every case is different. We will have to order the officer’s disclosure, which is the evidence that will be presented against you in court, to see what sort of defence we can build for your traffic ticket case. There are many different factors that can influence the outcome of a traffic ticket trial and until we have the full details, it is difficult to make an educated guess as to the outcome of your specific case. We fight for complete elimination for every traffic ticket and will only enter into a negotiation process to have the ticket reduced as a last resort. We have a 98% success rate of reducing or eliminating traffic tickets for our clients.

Can you guarantee my results?

No company can offer a guarantee any longer. Paralegals are now regulated by the Law Society of Upper Canada and this sort of guarantee cannot be offered. I would be very wary of any company that is offering any promises or guarantees as these offers are contrary to current regulations. There are many factors that can influence the outcome of a matter and until we have full disclosure, it is difficult to predict an outcome of any traffic ticket case. We have a 98% success rate of reducing or eliminating traffic ticket infractions.

What sort of factors can influence my case?

Officer’s disclosure is the biggest factor that can influence a traffic ticket case as that is the evidence that can be used against you in court. Any dialogue you may have had with the officer, the procedures he followed and his qualifications are some of the important elements of the disclosure. (examples: If you admitted your guilt to the officer, he would have recorded that information which would make it more difficult for us to build a solid defence.) Also, there is specific protocol that an officer is required to follow when handing out a ticket and if he didn’t record the procedures properly, there could be information that could help strengthen our defence.

Other factors that could influence elimination of a ticket are the officer’s presence in court, the delivery time of the disclosure, the amount of time between the offence date and the trial date and even the prosecutor and justice of peace that is hearing the matter. Since we are in ccourtrooms everyday, we are aware which prosecutors and JPs are more strict than others and when it would be a good idea to adjourn a matter to have the chance for it to be heard in front of a different JP.

Your past record could also influence this case.

I got a quote that was cheaper than yours. Why would I pay you more?

Because we pride ourselves in our professionalism, we cannot comment about our competitor’s operations specifically, but there are many companies out there that charge less because they provide less. Many times when you hire a service such as this, there is no work that goes into the case except for an agent to show up in court and plea down the matter to a lesser offence giving you no opportunity to have the traffic ticket eliminated. At Traffic Ticket Solutions we understand that every case is unique and individual and we will order the officer’s disclosure and do research in to your specific traffic ticket case with the ultimate goal of having the ticket eliminated completely from your record. Only after we exhaust all options to have a traffic ticket eliminated would we enter into a negotiation process to have the ticket reduced. This gives you more of a chance to have your case completely withdrawn instead of just being reduced.

Also, we are one of the only traffic ticket companies in Ontario that is operated by a law firm. We have a lawyer on staff available to help supervise our cases and give input where needed. You get lawyer quality for a paralegal’s price with the added security that we are a reputable company. Our professional staff consists of a lawyer, licenced paralegal and law clerks. We work in conjunction with other paralegals, former police officers and former prosecutors with experience and success at fighting and winning traffic ticket cases just like yours.

We also believe that we offer the best service out there for the best price. Our customer service driven approach separates us from our competition as we keep you fully informed and updated every step of the way. We are so confident in our customer service that we encourage you to shop around to see and hear the difference! We are sure you will choose us to be your traffic ticket solution.

If I file my court date and order disclosure, will your price go down?

Filing for a court date and ordering the disclosure are included in the price quoted to you and is not an additional charge. All it takes to complete these tasks is time and we offer these services in our price as a full package. But the real reason that anyone would hire a professional to fight their ticket is because they have the expertise to fight and win traffic tickets! A traffic ticket is not won by standing in an hour-long line at the court waiting to file for a trial date. Traffic tickets are won when a professional gets full opportunity to review the officer’s disclosure (evidence against you) and build a solid defence for your matter that will hold up in court. This is where the cost comes in since not just anyone can do this job. It takes a professional experienced in the Highway Traffic Act to know what mistakes officers commonly make and what to look for in the disclosure. What case law may pertain to their matter and if there are any charter motions that the case may be eligible for. When you hire Traffic Ticket Solutions Law Firm, you get all of this, with the added bonus of not having to wait in line at the court for an hour to get your ticket filed!

The officer told me to fight my ticket. Why would he do that? Will he reduce my ticket?

Officers now get paid time and a half to be present in court and it is not very often at all that you will go to court and NOT have your officer present. Think about it from this perspective…if you were an officer and you got paid time and a half to sit in court all day, would you not tell as many people as possible to go to court to fight their ticket? And what happens if you trust the officer (the person that pulled you over and issued you the ticket) and show up in court and the officer has a “change of heart” and is there ready to take your case to trial? Now you have no representation, no legal defence built and a cop that doesn’t mind getting paid overtime to conduct a lengthy trial to prove that you are guilty! At that point, if you are found guilty and would like to reverse that decision, an appeal would be required to be launched against the decision which costs a lot more time and money than a regular traffic ticket trial.

How long does a ticket remain on my driving record?

If found guilty of an traffic ticket, the offence will remain on your record forever. BUT insurance companies only look at your record for the past three years. This means that if you received a ticket when you were 16 years old, 30 years ago, that ticket will still be viewable by anyone who can view your entire driving history (such as the courts) but 3 year driving records are what are supplied to insurance companies. Demerit points will remain on your record for 2 years from the date of the offence and will then disappear.

I heard that if I mail a cheque in for my fine with a few dollars extra, the ticket will not show on my record. Is this true?

Absolutely not. This myth has been flying around the internet for years and is absolutely false! The myth states that if you send in a cheque for more than the amount of the traffic ticket, they will issue you a refund cheque for the overdue amount and your ticket case will remain open indefinitely if you do not cash that refund cheque. Please do not believe this as once you are found guilty of an offence, the ticket will show up on your records right away and does not rely on any sort of payment for it to be completed. All this will result in is the courts receiving a few extra dollars from you and you will likely not ever receive any sort of a refund.

Will my insurance go up from one ticket on my record?

This really all depends on your insurance company as they are all different. Please refer to our insurance page for information on how most insurance companies react to one ticket on your record.

Can an officer accurately clock my speed when he is in a moving vehicle also?

Yes. There are two types of radar guns: Stationary and moving. The moving radar is used in a moving police car and is calibrated to be able to factor in the speed of the moving police car. This means that if the police car is moving at 50 km/hr and the radar detects that the moving vehicle is moving away at 30 km/hr, the speed of the moving vehicle will be 80 km/hr. This is definitely an accurate form of speed detection and will hold up in court if the officer has his proper training and qualifications.

Where can I keep updated on traffic ticket news and information?

At Traffic Ticket Solutions we believe that the more informed the public is about traffic tickets, the better decisions they can make while driving, and what to do if they do receive a ticket. You can find Traffic Ticket Solutions on Facebook (become a fan of Traffic Ticket Solutions Law Firm) or Twitter (find us under @TTSLawFirm).